The Safe Sex Lie
“Experiment and do whatever you want, but just use a condom,” is the safe sex lie that is promoted on our schools
and college campuses. The media also promotes the notion that sex is purely recreational. The result is that many women
believe that our current “hook up” culture is natural and even empowering to women and that love and sex are two completely
different things.
As with most lies, the whole story is not told.
Problem #1Casual sex is not a natural part of the human make-up. Sex is a bonding experience, and when the bond
is broken by multiple partners, the body and mind have a conflict. This conflict is caused by a hormone called oxytocin,
and this is what makes love so ecstatic but also so hurtful. In women, oxytocin (the bonding hormone) is released after
birth and during breastfeeding. Oxytocin is what helps a woman bond with her baby. Oxytocin is also released during orgasm
in both of the sexes. In the brain, oxytocin is involved in social recognition and bonding, and it builds trust between people.
This hormone is much stronger in women. Why is this significant? When a woman has shared herself on an intimate level with
someone, she will discover that although she is trying to be cool about it, she has a bond with that person that is not easily
given up.
Why are we finding more and more women fighting depression, struggling with keeping their grades up,
spending time wondering if he is going to call today, and hoping that he will ask them to go out, or to take the “relationship”
to the next level? If given the opportunity, many women would share that they have these thoughts.
Men and women are different sexually, and this is seen physically, emotionally, and physiologically.
Especially for women, when sexually intimate bonds are made they are meant to be made to last a lifetime. When these bonds
break, pain, regret,
desperation, and depression are often what is left behind.
God designed sex to take place within a committed marriage relationship and in the marriage relationship oxytocin is a gift
from Him. Outside of the relationship He designed, it only adds to the heartache.
“When you have sex with someone, you are having sex with everyone they have had sex with for the last ten years,
and everyone they and their partners have had sex with for the last ten years.” --C. Everett Koop (Former U.S. Surgeon General)
Problem #2
There are many serious diseases you are not protected from by wearing a condom. Sexually Transmitted Infections such as HPV and
Herpes are transmitted by skin-to-skin contact, and not by fluid exchange. A condom does not cover the entire genital area and these
infections are transmitted via sores or warts (which may or may not always be visible or readily apparent) and by contact with
parts of the genitals NOT covered by the condom.
HPV stands for HUMAN PAPILLOMA VIRUS (genital warts). There are more than 30 different known strains of HPV that are genital-
many that are potentially cancerous, and some that are direct causes of cervical cancer, which kills 7,000 women each year.
Even when the warts are removed, the virus is still present in the body, and can be transmitted to partners when no warts are present,
causing long-term problems. Those using condoms are still at a substantial risk of transmitting or contracting HPV. About
20 million people, in the United States alone, are known to carry this virus. Many others do not know they have it.
HSV-2 (genital herpes) is one of the most common sexually transmitted diseases in the United States, with as many as one
million people in the United States becoming infected each year. There are 45 million people who are infected with genital herpes,
one in every five. In addition, HSV-1 (oral herpes) is carried by about one in every two people in the United States (50%), and can
be spread via oral or oral/genital contact, creating a genital herpes infection with HSV-1. Lesions appear at the site of infection
and periodic eruptions of painful blister and ulcers can come anywhere on the body. Herpes symptoms and outbreaks can be reduced with
medication, but the disease still remains in the body even when treated. Like HPV, there is currently no cure for herpes infections.
Is It Worth the Risk To
You?
At the Pregnancy Care Center we feel passionate that sexual intimacy is meant for a marriage relationship and that REAL
love has the other person’s interests, safety, and good in mind.
Remaining abstinent until marriage is the only answer for safe sex that is really safe!
Here are some
quick facts:
- Sexually Transmitted Diseases are the most common diseases in American next to the common cold and flu.
- The estimated total number of people living in the US with a incurable STD is over 65 million. Every year,
there are approximately 9 million new cases of STDs, among 15-24 year olds. (That is nearly 25,000 a day!)
In the general population there are nearly 19 million people infected each year. (52,000 a day)
- More than 1 in 5 Americans are presently infected with an STD.
- 20 different STDs are rampant among the young.
- Less than half of adults ages 18 to 44 have ever been tested
for an STD other than HIV/AIDS.
- Often, people infected with STDs do not have initial symptoms and can transmit disease unknowingly to new partners.
- Of the STDs that are diagnosed, only some (gonorrhea, syphilis,
chlamydia, hepatitis A and B) are required to be reported to state health
departments and the CDC.
- It is estimated that as many as one in four Americans have
genital herpes, a lifelong (but manageable) infection, yet up to 90 percent of
those with herpes are unaware they have it.
- At least 15 percent of all American women who are infertile can
attribute it to tubal damage caused by pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) , the
result of an untreated STD.
- STDs often cause chronic pain and permanent damage.
Source: Is Sex Safe?, (brochure) Heritage House '76, Inc. 2008
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